The fitness wearable device space has become popular due to the proliferation of mobile phones with low power wireless interfaces such as Bluetooth Low Energy (hereinafter BLE), Near Field Communication (hereinafter NFC), and Wifi Direct. Accessories like pedometers, heart rate monitors, and smart glasses leverage the Personal Area Network around the mobile device to enable powerful health and fitness solutions. One class of wearable pedometers attempt to detect the wearer's activity by pattern matching their motions against a database of known exercises. This approach can identify the exercise and number of repetitions carried out, but falls short in capturing the equipment used; for instance, weights lifted at a gym or the clubs swung on a golf course.
Methods exist for connectable devices to identify themselves via a pairing process. In one case, patent US20100167646A1, a pairing code is generated on each device as a result of motion data captured during the pairing period. Only the pairing code rather than the motion data is exchanged between devices. This is not a viable option for equipment identification because putting devices into pairing mode, generating pairing codes over a set period of time, and limiting the identification to only one device per period is too intrusive for what it's worth. A fitness session requires a more seamless experience where the identification of fitness objects is invisible to users.